Hope In Spite Of Darkness
by dragongoddess13
Summary: He felt claustrophobic, like he couldn't spread out in his bunk, like it was closing in on him. He tossed and turned, curled up in a ball, the blood pounding behind his eyes, throbbing in his temples. His muscles ached, his body wrung taught. Story 3 in the Hope In The Desert Series


Hope In Spite of Darkness

Smuggler Ben/Scavenger Rey

Story III

xXx

He felt claustrophobic, like he couldn't spread out in his bunk, like it was closing in on him. He tossed and turned, curled up in a ball, the blood pounding behind his eyes, throbbing in his temples. His muscles ached, his body wrung taught. A ball of rage tightened in his chest, and Ben only recognized it as such from his past battle with the toxic emotion. Behind his closed eyelids, he could only see darkness, the faintest trace of unnatural light beyond it. The sounds were all muffled like he was fading into unconsciousness.

And then it happened, all at once the rage exploded and with it an overwhelming sense of the force the likes of which he'd only felt in his darkest moments.

Ben sat bolt upright, gasping for breath. A thin sheen of sweat across his skin. His hands were shaking, his body on high alert.

"Kriffing hell." He breathed, slowly scanning his quarters in The Resistance's D'Qar base.

After leaving Jakku, Ben hadn't made it very far before running into The First Order. He'd managed to evade them, but not without spending nearly a week and half running them in circles from one planet to the next and all the empty space in between. He'd been forced to jump into Hyperspace at the last moment, sustaining new damage and worsening damage he'd already incurred from the last firefight with several tie fighters.

He'd managed to make it to D'Qar and now he was stranded while he, his father and Chewie worked to fix the Falcon.

Two days ago, nearly four since he'd landed, he'd started feeling… antsy. Like there was something out there waiting for him and he needed to get off this planet and search for it as soon as possible.

His parents kept looking at him with barely concealed concern bringing back bad childhood memories. He couldn't blame them though. Those times were difficult for all of them, the constant reminder of the Skywalker legacy right there, everyday for them to face. But they faced it and they came out stronger, closer for it. There was nothing for them to worry about now. He wasn't about to shunt all of his progress away, not after all these years.

Ben sighed, the initial tension was mostly dissipated but that nagging feeling was as strong as ever. He leaned back, propped against the pillows, running a hand through his hair. It was probably too early to get up, but at this point he was sure he wasn't getting back to sleep. There was just too much going on in his head for that at this point.

So, he got out of bed, grabbed a shower in the refresher, dressed and headed out for the repair hanger. When he got there, he was surprised to see he wasn't the only one who couldn't sleep.

"Uncle Chewie." Ben greeted and the Wookie growled back. Chewbacca was fiddling with a panel under the cockpit. After a moment he called out to someone Ben hadn't noticed.

"Got it." Mara Jade replied as the outer searchlights flickered on. Ben took a step back and peered through the cockpit windows to find his aunt at the controls. "Hey kid." she continued, her voice staticy over the loudspeakers. A second later the light switched off and not long after that Mara Jade was descending the ramp. "What are you doing up, hun?"

"I could ask you guys the same thing." he replied.

"I couldn't sleep, your uncle is doing that Jedi meditation thing and despite my past history it is extremely disconcerting to sleep next to someone who is barely breathing."

Ben laughed. "I can imagine."

"What about you?"

Ben looked away and sighed. "Just...intense dreams." he explained.

"Force dreams?" Chewbacca growled.

"I think so." Mara looked concerned. "It's not the same as when I was a kid though." he continued. "It's almost as if I'm not feeling my own emotions."

"A force bond, maybe." Mara suggested.

"A what?"

"A force bond. A bond between two force users that connects them both mentally and emotionally. Luke and Leia are force bonded because their twins. Have they never told you about this?" Ben shook his head. "Did you meet another force user recently?"

Realization came crashing down on Ben and he looked up, wide eyed and startled. "Rey!" he exclaimed. "Shit, how could I not realize that?"

Chewbacca growled in concern, but Ben was beyond comfort.

"I have to go, I have to get back to her." Ben made a move to leave, but Mara cut him off.

"Ben, stop, calm down. You can't go anywhere with the Falcon in this condition." she told him. "Now, tell me what happened while we work on her."

Mara led him up into the ship while Chewbacca stayed outside to work.

Ben told her everything as they stripped panels and reconnected wiring. How he had gotten there just as Rey was leaving with the signal shielder. How he attacked her and she got the best of him, escaping back to the outpost. How he let her trade it in because it was obvious she was starving and needed the portions.

"He barely gave her a quarter of what that part was clearly worth." Ben exclaimed in outrage, oblivious to Mara's amusement. "So, I tried to convince her to help me break in and steal it."

"How did that work out?"

"She laughed at me. Said it was impossible and if she helped me she wouldn't be able to live there anymore. I offered to take her with me, but she said no. So the next morning I went back to the outpost and bought the part from him."

"You bought it?" Mara sounded skeptical.

"Yeah, except I used the dummy system you created. The one that makes it look like your transfering credits from one account to the next."

Mara sighed. "So now she's potentially in danger if anyone saw you together."

Ben nodded. "She found me when I was leaving. I offered to take her with me again and for a moment I thought she would, but… I don't know, something seemed to be keeping her there." he shook his head and ducked back into the panel he was working on. "I gave her a transponder beacon in case she changed her mind or she was in danger."

"How much time did you spend with her?' Mara asked.

"Less than a day." he replied, too focused on the rewiring the panel in front of him to notice Mara's amused smile.

"And you offered to bring her on as your copilot after that?"

"Yeah, I mean, I know it seems sudden but…"

"It doesn't actually." Mara interrupted. "Not if you two are force bonded."

"How does a force bond happen? It makes sense with mom and Uncle Luke, but Rey and I barely know each other."

"From what Luke has been able to figure out, a force bond is usually between two people who are equals. So, this Rey must be equally as strong, or potentially as strong in the force as you are."

Ben didn't reply immediately, his mind working through this new information.

The idea that Rey could be as strong as him was both thrilling and terrifying. As a child, Ben had stood out among the other Jedi Padawans, so much so that he was certain it contributed to some of his darker moments. He could remember the looks the others would give him, the fear from his fellow padawans. He reminded people too much of Anakin and that made people nervous.

Ben struggled with the darkness for years, fighting against his grandfather's legacy. With every meditation, he found himself being lured to the dark side. The only thing that seemed to keep the voices at bay were thoughts of his family. When the darkness came, he would flood his mind with thoughts of them. His mother's smile, his father's humor, his uncle's laughter in the face of his aunt's dry wit. On really bad days he imagined Chewbacca and his tribe in his mind, growling at anything that tried to hurt him.

Sometimes none of that worked, sometimes he spent his nights wide awake, looking for anything that could stave off the the darkness. It all came to a head when he was sixteen. He'd had a particularly bad day, the voices stronger than ever and he and Luke had had a fight. Ben hadn't really talked about his struggle, but he knew his mother and uncle could feel it. Luke had been harping on him about not meditating properly, a feat he found difficult when the voices were bad and Ben had snapped.

In a blind rage, Ben attacked Luke, his mind barely clearing enough for him to stop himself in time. He left the temple after that, stealing an x-wing from the Temple Fleet and setting out on his own journey of discovery. It took years but with hard work and a lot of self reflection he managed to pull himself free of the darkness and give himself a fighting chance.

In all those years it was the feelings of being alone, of no one truly understanding what he was going through, that wore the heaviest on his control, but now there was someone else out there, someone like him. Someone who could understand what he felt, what he had struggled with.

He vaguely wondered why he hadn't noticed her force sensitivity when they had first met, but he quickly pushed it aside. There would be time to consider all of that later, when he got back to her; when he knew she was safe. The unbridled rage that had woken him from his nightmares was all too familiar. Whatever was happening to Rey was pushing her to the edge of her control and possibly awakening her force sensitivity like an opening floodgate.

They worked for a few hours, rewiring panels, replacing burned out parts. Every once and while Mara would ask him a question, almost always about what he was feeling. Every time she asked he realized he hadn't noticed, too distracted with the work. Unfortunately, every time he thoughts about it, he realized the emotions were different and none of them were good.

Within a few hours the Falcon roared back to life and Ben jumped to his feet in a hurry bolting for the cockpit. Mara followed behind him at a much more sedate pace. In the cockpit, Ben was fiddling with a wall panel, the beeping coming from it, unmistakable.

Mara opened her mouth to reply, only to be interrupted.

"Ben?" Han's voice called out from the main body of the ship. They could hear Chewbacca growling, Leia answering him. A moment later, all three were there. "You guys got her up and running, good work." Han said, his attention drawn to the wall panel. "Where's the transponder coming from?"

"Jakku." Ben replied absently. Despite the company, his focus hadn't changed.

"How long has it been going off, Ben?" Mara asked.

Ben turned to look at her, desperation in his eyes. "Two days, almost three." he said. He shook his head, jumping into action. "I have to go. If your not coming with me, then disembark now."

"Go where, Ben? What's wrong?" Leia questioned.

Mara spoke up before he could. "I'll explain it later." she turned back to Ben. "You can't go by yourself, it could be a trap."

Chewbacca let out a roar of agreement and pushed passed everyone, plopping down in the co-pilot seat.

"Alright, let's go." Ben didn't argue, taking his own seat. He vaguely heard Mara usher his parents out and it was only after the ramp went up that he registered the fact that he was probably worrying them. He would think about that later though. For now he needed to focus on one thing and one thing only.

Getting back to Rey.

xXx

Jakku was as he had left it. Desolate, barren and far too hot for his tastes. His father had always thought it was funny that of everything that had been passed down in his blood line, a hatred for sand had been one of them.

" _It gets everywhere, it doesn't go away not matter how many showers you take. It gets too hot and it destroys machinery."_ he could just hear his Uncle now. They weren't on Tatooine though. No, at least Tatooine had civilization. This was a planet for Scavengers and the junk boss they were all forced to bow to.

Ben steered the Falcon outside the range of Nima Outpost. The last thing he needed was someone tipping off Plutt to his arrival. If he could, he wanted to avoid running into him or his men at all.

Chewbacca growled beside him, drawing Ben out of his thoughts. "The beacon puts her three klicks passed the location of her shelter. Out in the mountain range."

Chewbacca growled again.

"I'm aware that this could be a trap, but this is open desert, there's no way to mask our approach."

His growl was only slightly higher pitched this time.

"I only have one speeder bike and it can't carry all three of us." Ben finally looked at him at his next response. "What do you mean Aunt Mara told you to load a sand speeder? Why didn't you say something sooner."

He growled again.

"I'm not that distracted!"

Chewbacca merely shook his head and turned back to the control panel. One klick from the beacon, Ben landed the Falcon and then together they piled into the sand speeder, Mara had had the foresight to send him off with.

They followed the beacon further into the desert, passed the mountains and into an open stretch of sand. Ben almost missed her, her tan robes blending into the landscape. His heart dropped, not even reaching out, feeling her in the force could assuage his fears.

Ben parked a few feet from her, trusting Chewbacca to keep his eyes open.

Rey was lying on her side, her arms up around her head in an attempt to keep the sun at bay. Her breathing was shallow and her tanned skin was bright red. She wasn't even sweating anymore, a sure sign that she had been out here for far too long.

Ben reached for her, "Rey?" he called softly. He rolled her over. "Rey? Sweetheart, can you hear me?" he tried again a little more insistently. He pulled her arms away from her face, untangling them. "Rey? Princess?"

Her eyes opened and Ben felt a surge of hope flow through him. It was only as she spoke that he realized he was feeling _her_ hope through their bond. "Ben? You came back for me?" her voice was hoarse, barely above a whisper. He could only imagine how much it must have hurt to speak. The skin of her lips was dry and cracked and he'd honestly never seen anyone more beautiful.

"Of course," he smiled, leaning over her to block out the sun. "Can't leave my copilot stranded."

Chewbacca roared then, and Ben realized he could hear repulsors in the distance. He turned abruptly, spotting the dark silhouettes of speeders on the horizon. Chewbacca spun around, pulling his blaster from its holster and shooting at the chain around her ankle. Ben cursed himself for not noticing it before as he scooped her into his arms and took off for the sand speeder. Ben didn't really have time to consider anything except driving them out of there as blaster fire started landing around them. Chewbacca returned fire as they sped off, leading a chase through the barren landscape. Ben didn't dare look away from the horizon, determined to get them out of there alive and in one piece. He didn't go through all of this not to get Rey out of here, not to get her to safety, to a better life.

Ben caught sight of the Falcon in the distance and banked to the right to buy them a little extra time to put distance between them and their pursuers. Chewbacca roared back at him not long after and he knew he'd gotten as much distance as he was ever going to get, so he corrected course and made a beeline for the Falcon.

"Get her settled I've got to get us off the ground." Ben ordered as they ascended the ramp. His heart was pounding, his adrenaline spiking out of control. He needed to calm down or he was going to make a mistake, and a mistake at this point would cost them far too much.

xXx

Ben felt the last dregs of oppressive heat slip away as he stared out into the inky blackness of space. D'Qar was just ahead and it wouldn't be long now before he could finally relax.

Rey had been in and out of consciousness for a few days now, not aware enough for any kind of conversation. Once they'd hit hyperspace, he'd hooked her up to an IV for fluids and treated the sun poisoning as best he could. She would be alright for now, but he was eager for the medics at the base to look her over.

Chewbacca lumbered in as he prepared for descent into the atmosphere and took a seat beside him. He grumbled off Rey's status as he helped with prep.

"Thanks Uncle Chewie. I appreciate all your help."

The Wookie brushed it off.

"As soon as the medics look her over and tell me what she needs, I'm going to take her out of here. Find some place to hunker down while she recuperates."

Chewbacca growled.

"I know I'd be safer with all of you, but I don't know what Plutt will do now, if he'll come after her. The last thing the Resistance needs is to have their location outed to The First Order by an angry junk boss."

Chewbacca growled off a remark about having his father's hero complex and lack of self preservation and Ben laughed.

A long forgotten voice whispered in the back of his mind, " _Too much of your father in you."_ but he brushed it off without really processing it.


End file.
